The commercial significance of Cambridge continued to grow in the 12th century with river trade becoming increasingly more important. In 1209, a group of students fleeing riots in Oxford came to Cambridge and by 1318 this community of teachers and students had received formal recognition from the Pope as a "studium generale".

The Gate of Honour is one of three famous gates symbolically marking the steps of a student's career. The first gate, extremely simple in design, is called Humility; the second stands in the center of Gonville and Caius College and is the Gate of Virtue, (one of the first buildings in England in the Renaissance style). The most elaborate gate is the Gate of Honour, through which students pass on their way to the Senate House to receive their degrees.